We all know that within a LAN, we can make use of magic packet to turn on any number of systems. But how to wake up a remote pc which is in some remote LAN?In my previous question on WOL, some one said that we cannot turn on the remote pc, because anybody’s pc can be easily turned on. Thats true. But we can use a unique password to wake on the system. when i referred wikipedia i got this “
Certain NICs support a security feature called “SecureOn”. It allows users to store within the NIC a hexadecimal password of 6 bytes. Clients have to append this password to the magic packet. The NIC wakes the system only if the MAC address and password are correct. This security measure significantly decreases the risk of successful brute force attacks, by increasing the search space by 48 bits (6 bytes), up to 296 combinations if the MAC address is entirely unknown. However any network eavesdropping will expose the cleartext password.Still, only a few NIC and router manufacturers support such security features”.
From this it is clear that WOL implementation with password protection is possible. So why is it not possible to wake on remote pc with secure password?(i need to give an analogy here:assume that u send a msg using ur cell phone to ur friend who is in remote place. the conversation is secure. similarly is there any way to turn my system into a reception point, so that when i send a wake on message, the system gets turned on.?)
You’d need something in the remote LAN to re-broadcast the WoL magic packet. Some routers have this capability, or you can make use of an always on PC within the LAN. Most routers will filter Broadcasts (..*.255) sent to them and not pass them through to any subnets, so it entirely depends on your router.